Drug Psychosis News

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 2, 2016 – More than half of Americans have at least one chronic disease, mental illness or problem with drugs or alcohol, according to a new study. "The health of individuals in the U.S.A. is increasingly being defined by complexity and multimorbidity, the co-occurrence of two or more chronic medical conditions," said the study authors, Elizabeth Lee Reisinger Walker and Dr. Benjamin Druss. They emphasized that people with multiple health issues need more access to care and better coordination among their health care providers. The Emory University researchers examined public health records to find out what percentage of U.S. adults have chronic medical conditions, mental illness or substance abuse problems, and how many were also living in poverty. Chronic medical conditions looked at in the study included asthma, cirrhosis, diabetes, heart disease, hepatitis, high ... Read more

TUESDAY, Nov. 1, 2016 – Released prisoners may be less likely to commit violent crimes if they're prescribed certain kinds of psychiatric medications, a new study suggests. These medications can affect someone's mental state. They include antidepressants, antipsychotics, psychostimulants, drugs to treat addiction and antiepileptic drugs, the researchers said. The study authors looked at information on more than 22,000 prisoners in Sweden. They were released between July 2005 and December 2010. The researchers had a median of nearly five years of follow-up information. During that time, 18 percent of the prisoners committed violent crimes, the researchers said. Three classes of drugs were linked to much lower rates of violent crimes. Antipsychotics were tied to a 42 percent reduction in violent crimes. For psychostimulants, the reduction was 38 percent. Drugs to treat addiction were ... Read more

MONDAY, Oct. 17, 2016 – People with mental illness often wait long hours – or even days – in an emergency room before receiving the care they need, according to a new poll conducted by the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP). One in five ER doctors polled said they've had psychiatric patients who needed hospitalization who had to wait two to five days before being assigned an in-patient bed, the poll found. Two accompanying studies back up the poll results, revealing that patients with a wide array of mental health problems are more likely to wind up stuck in an emergency department for more than 24 hours. "Once the decision to admit is made, it can be nearly impossible to find an in-patient bed for these patients," ACEP President Dr. Rebecca Parker said during a news briefing. Findings from the survey were scheduled to be presented Monday at ACEP's annual meeting in Las ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 28, 2016 – A subsidized independent-living intervention appears to help homeless young people with mental illness get and keep a roof over their heads, a new Canadian study indicates. Called Housing First, the program has previously been tested with homeless adults with mental illness, and has been found to improve housing stability and quality of life, the researchers said. "Housing First is based on the concept of housing as a human right," said study lead author Dr. Nicole Kozloff. "[It's] the idea that having a safe and stable place to live is critical to helping people improve their mental health and achieve their goals," she said. Kozloff is a postdoctoral fellow with the Centre for Urban Health Solutions at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute of St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto. Since it first was first introduced in the 1990s, studies have repeatedly found ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 – People with serious mental illness who are victims of violence or exposed to stressful events are more likely to engage in a violent crime in the week following the trauma, a new study contends. Stressful experiences also affect people without psychiatric disorders, but not to the same extent, the researchers said. Some stressful events – such as being violently victimized, injured in an accident, losing one's parents or self-harming – act as "triggers," said study co-author Dr. Seena Fazel. He is a professor of forensic psychiatry at the University of Oxford in England. Experiencing one of these events increases the risk of committing a violent criminal act within a week of the trigger, especially in people with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, Fazel said. People diagnosed with these conditions have higher rates of criminal convictions than the general ... Read more

FRIDAY, April 22, 2016 – The anti-smoking drugs Chantix (varenicline) and Wellbutrin (bupropion) don't appear to raise the risk of serious mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts, a new study suggests. "Clinical guidelines recommend that the most effective way to give up smoking is smoking cessation medication and counseling. However, smokers do not use these services enough, in part due to concerns that the medications may not be safe," said lead author Dr. Robert Anthenelli, professor of psychiatry at University of California, San Diego. The new study, published April 22 in The Lancet, should help ease those concerns for patients, the researchers said. The study was requested by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration due to concerns about the safety of the drugs used to help people quit smoking. Funding was provided by drug makers Pfizer (which makes ... Read more

FRIDAY, March 18, 2016 – Exercise can reduce symptoms in teens and young adults who had a first psychosis episode, a new study says. "Establishing an exercise regime for people with psychosis is likely to be much more effective when they are younger, and in the earliest stages of treatment. Getting people into a routine early on also helps set habits for life, which can make a huge difference to their long-term physical and mental health," study author Joseph Firth, from the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom, said in a university news release. Young people diagnosed with psychosis typically face a difficult future, with high rates of relapse, unemployment and premature death. And, drugs they may need to take can cause rapid weight gain, the researchers said. The study included 31 people who had a first psychosis episode. They were between 18 and 35 years old. The study ... Read more

THURSDAY, March 3, 2016 – People diagnosed with psychosis will probably have a longer, harder struggle to maintain their mental health if they're regular marijuana users, British researchers report. And those who just experienced their first episode of psychotic illness are 50 percent more likely to need subsequent hospitalization for their condition if they use marijuana, according to findings published online March 3 in the journal BMJ Open. They also spend longer periods in the hospital, averaging 35 more days in mental health wards during a five-year period than those with psychosis who don't use pot. Finally, marijuana users don't seem to respond to anti-psychotic medications as well as non-users, said lead researcher Rashmi Patel, a clinical lecturer with the Department of Psychosis Studies at King's College London. "We're not entirely sure why that is, but it's possible for ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 17, 2016 – Delirium in hospitalized patients might be linked to common antibiotics more often than once believed, according to new research. Delirium – mental confusion that may be paired with hallucinations and agitation – is often caused by medications. But, antibiotics are not typically the first type of drug suspected, said study lead author Dr. Shamik Bhattacharyya, a neurologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. Reviewing case reports going back seven decades on patients given antibiotics who later developed delirium and related issues, the scientists found that nearly half suffered delusions or hallucinations. Seven out of 10 were found to have abnormal electrical activity in the brain. "A key point in the study is that different antibiotics caused different types of confusion," Bhattacharyya said. "The fact that antibiotics can cause confusion has ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Dec. 30, 2015 – Stimulant medications, such as those used to treat attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), may raise the risk for psychotic side effects among young patients who have a parent with a history of serious mental illness, new research suggests. The study included 141 children and young adults aged 6 to 21. Nearly two-thirds of those prescribed stimulant medications had a psychotic side effect. These side effects included hallucinations, delusions, hearing voices, and/or perceptual disturbances, the researchers said. By comparison, psychotic effects affected just over one-quarter of those who had not taken a stimulant drug, the study showed. "These meds can be extremely helpful, including in kids with a family history of mental illness," said study lead author Dr. Rudolf Uher. He is an associate professor and Canada research chair in early intervention in ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Dec. 9, 2015 – Bullying can lead to lasting psychological effects for both victims and tormentors, researchers report. More than 20 percent of children who have suffered bullying are prone to depression serious enough to require medical help by their late 20s, researchers from Finland said. "Frequent victimization at age 8 is associated with adult psychiatric disorders needing treatment," said lead researcher Dr. Andre Sourander, a professor in the department of child psychiatry at the University of Turku. Besides depression, researchers found that bullying or being bullied were associated with psychosis, anxiety, and drug and alcohol abuse. "We need to understand the importance of early peer and school experiences for children," Sourander said. "We should integrate a mental health perspective to anti-bullying campaigns, because early intervention can prevent long-term ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Dec. 2, 2015 – Smoking high-potency marijuana might damage nerve fibers that connect the brain's two hemispheres, a new study reports. MRI scans of nearly 100 people – including some diagnosed with psychosis – associated frequent use of high-potency "skunk" marijuana with damage to the corpus callosum, the largest white matter structure in the brain. "We found that frequent use of high-potency cannabis significantly affects the structure of white matter fibers in the brain, whether you have psychosis or not," said senior researcher Dr. Paola Dazzan, of the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King's College London. Further, her team said the damage appears to be dose-dependent. "This reflects a sliding scale where the more cannabis you smoke and the higher the potency, the worse the damage will be," Dazzan said in a college news release. This is vital ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 25, 2015 – The drug clozapine reduces symptoms in schizophrenia patients who don't benefit from other antipsychotic medications, a new study indicates. The finding, culled from an analysis of Medicaid data on more than 6,200 patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia, was published recently in the American Journal of Psychiatry. "These results give clinicians important guidance for how to help an extremely vulnerable group of people," said study author Dr. T. Scott Stroup, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City and a research psychiatrist at New York State Psychiatric Institute. "By helping individuals with treatment-resistant schizophrenia get effective treatment sooner, we can expect better outcomes," Stroup said in a Columbia news release. Antipsychotic drugs relieve symptoms in most people with schizophrenia, but up to ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 18, 2015 – Nearly one in 10 Americans has some type of lifelong drug use disorder, a new federal government survey finds. But only a quarter of them get the treatment they need, researchers said. The findings stem from a large U.S. National Institutes of Health survey. It's the first survey based on updated mental health guidelines that set a higher bar for diagnosing drug addiction than previous guidelines. "But the seriousness and persistence of the situation doesn't appear to have changed all that drastically since our last look at this," said study lead author Bridget Grant. "What we see," Grant added, "is that a little over 23 million Americans are directly affected with a lifelong problem. And many more are affected when you consider that the issue involves not just the user but also the user's family and social network. And on top of that we also see that ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 11, 2015 – Despite guidelines, diabetes screening rates are low among adults with severe mental illness who take antipsychotic medications, researchers find. In a new California study, fewer than one-third of mental health patients were screened for type 2 diabetes, despite an elevated risk for the disorder, the researchers reported in the Nov. 9 online edition of the journal JAMA Internal Medicine. Treatment with antipsychotic drugs contributes to this risk, the researchers explained. This class of drugs includes clozapine (Clozaril), olanzapine (Zyprexa) and risperidone (Risperdal), among others. Anyone taking them should undergo diabetes screening every year, the American Diabetes Association says. These drugs often cause weight gain, a contributing factor to type 2 diabetes, the study authors noted in a journal news release. "To improve care for persons with serious ... Read more